


a moth into the flame

by ghostheart



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Arson, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, Pre-Game(s), Sexual Assault, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-30
Updated: 2017-11-30
Packaged: 2019-02-08 14:23:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12866373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostheart/pseuds/ghostheart
Summary: “I’ve already heard about you, actually,” she admits shyly. “I’m — I’m a little surprised you’re talking to me.”“Why’s that?” he asks, chuckling. “You’re new around here. Of course I’m gonna be all over you!”They meet — not by chance.





	a moth into the flame

**Author's Note:**

> if i put all the applicable warnings and disclaimers here, this note would be half as long as the story itself. to summarize:
> 
> 1.) this story contains **emotional abuse, sexual coercion** (non-graphic/fade to black), **detailed depictions of fires/arson** , and one instance of **physical assault**. please keep yourself safe -- if any of this content is triggering or upsetting to you, i implore you to avoid this story.
> 
> 2.) i do not personally condone the attitudes or actions depicted here. in writing this, i sought to neither romanticize nor fetishize this dynamic.
> 
> 3.) title + in-line lyrics are from "moth into flame" by metallica
> 
> as always, i welcome constructive feedback.

_“decadence_

_death of the innocence_

_the pathway starts to spiral”_

* * *

“My name is Maki Harukawa. I hope we can get along...”

Her bare knees knock together with violence, betraying the veneer of goodwill and gregariousness she so effortfully puts forth. She flashes an ambassador’s smile and bows.

He takes her in from head to toe — glossy brown hair cascading to her ankles, porcelain skin, kaleidoscopic eyes that shift with the minute changes in her soul. She makes no effort to conceal her heart.

When she scans the room and those eyes meet his, he knows.

* * *

“Hey. You’re the transfer student, aren’t ya?”

Kaito approaches her before their lunch break pretending that he hasn’t memorized that fact and inscribed it indelibly in his mind. Maki Harukawa, the transfer student from Nagano proper.

She looks up from their textbook with a start, eyes wide with surprise.

“O-Oh, yes. That’s me. You’re...Momota-kun?” Her voice has a singsong quality to it, an intoxicating ebb and flow that he could listen to all day.

“Yep. Kaito Momota. I don’t think I had the chance to introduce myself the other day.”

Harukawa runs a hand through her pigtail. A blush tints her cheeks pink.

“I’ve already heard about you, actually,” she admits shyly. “I’m — I’m a little surprised you’re talking to me.”

He slides into the empty seat in front of her, sitting backwards to face her. Her beauty is just as bewitching up close as it was from the back of the class.

His fingers twitch.

“Why’s that?” he asks, chuckling. “You’re new around here. Of course I’m gonna be all over you!”

Harukawa’s eyes light up. She fidgets with her tie and looks sheepishly down at her desk. She isn’t the best conversationalist, but that doesn’t matter.

“Anyway, what brought you here from Nagano? This place is beat. Dunno why you’d come here.”

She looks back up at him; he matches her trusting gaze.

“My mom is sick and the air is a lot cleaner here. It’s not too far away from my dad’s job, either,” she explains.

“Still. I’m pretty sure you’re gonna be bored out of your damn mind.”

“Oh, no. It’s beautiful around here. I didn’t like the city very much.” She stares longingly at the mountains in the distance.

He’s silent at that. When she turns her gaze back to him, his eyebrows shoot up with a sudden thought.

“Hey! Why don’t we hang out? Today’s your first day, so...how about tomorrow?”

Kaito leans forward and looks straight into her crimson eyes. The depths of her heart are laid bare before him with crystal clarity. It reminds him of an animal that shrinks back from a huntsman. It should wound him, he thinks, but it does not.

Her blush intensifies, reddening and radiating upward.

“Just us? A-Alone?” she stammers softly.

He withdraws and grimaces, folding his arms over his chest.

“I guess I could bring some of our classmates along. But I really want to get to know you, Harukawa. I feel like they’d be kind of distractin’. You see where I’m coming from, right?”

She nods vigorously and leans forward to compensate for his withdrawal. She’s already coming out of her shell; that’s good, and it brings a smile to his face.

“So, how about it?”

“That would be really nice.”

His smile stretches to a toothy grin.

“Good. Meet me by the front gate tomorrow.”

* * *

Day after day, since the beginning of the school year, he has returned to his studio apartment in a desolate building overlooking the open fields of Komagane. It seemed like such an elegant solution; after all, his parents had not a single qualm with having him leave their house.

Yet, now, as he stares at the seamless night sky, he wonders just how much of a “solution” it truly was. Marinating in his reality minute after masochistic minute has become the definitive experience of his everyday life. 

Restrictions. That’s what his life has always been about. Restraints from his parents, from teachers, the police, even himself — life is all about what he cannot do.

He imbibes the sweet libation of rage every night to brace himself for the next day. The rage never reduces, never recedes. He manages to beat it into submission only during moments like this, where he gazes deep into the heart of a fire.

An abandoned farm and its corresponding field are his respite. He occasionally flirts with danger and chooses other settings, if only to make himself known, but it is safer here. Few people ever come this way and the air is dense with moisture. There’s little chance of things getting out of hand due to weather, although he’s been doing this for so many years that the odds of things getting out of his control to begin with are rather slim.

He laughs dryly. The world seems so infinite from this position in front of the open barn door — the rolling fields stretch on for miles, running tangent to the limitless expanse of the sky. The vastness of it all eclipses the orange glow of the flames in front of him. 

It’s deception at its fucking finest.

The beginning of the end was when humans tempered themselves and imposed these arbitrary rules for the rest of them to follow.

* * *

He waits with his back against the black gate’s tallest post, hands in his pockets. Some students filter out of the double doors; most stay behind for clubs. Classmates greet him on their way out.

“What’re you doing, Momota?” one of them calls out as he approaches the gate.

“The transfer student and I are hanging out.”

His classmate’s expression is an even mix of surprised and entertained.

“Why don’t you guys come with us? We’re going to karaoke,” he offers.

Kaito waves his hand in a vague gesture of dismissal.

“I don’t think she’s ready to hang out with a whole bunch of people together yet. I’m just gonna take her around and get her used to the place,” he says.

Unless his eyes are deceiving him, his classmate hesitates for a fleeting moment before nodding.

“Yeah, I get that. But if you change your mind, just text us.”

Kaito tracks him with his eyes as he walks through the gate and into the street.

“Momota-kun!”

Harukawa’s voice drifts on the spring draft, as light as the ringing of a handbell. She rushes over to him, blazer slung over her forearm and pigtails flowing in the breeze. The April sunlight imbues her skin with radiance despite her pallor — an animated doll walking among the rest of them.

She bounds up to him, face glowing with excitement.

“You ready?”

“Yeah.” She sidles up next to him as they begin crossing the threshold beyond the gate.

He won’t allow her to see his sanctuary straight away. He doesn’t trust her with that quite yet. So they walk down the road toward Mukogaoka Park; it’s a shitty excuse for a public space, inadvertently making it one of the most private places in town. There’s nowhere to sit except for the swings or the bare earth. He leads her to the rusted swing set where she duly sits. Without a word, she begins swinging back and forth like a child. He conceals his simper with the palm of his hand and sits in the adjacent swing.

“Are you already done with this hellhole?” he asks wryly. “Komagane, that is.”

“It’s really quiet and peaceful. And everyone’s been so much nicer than they were in Nagano.” Harukawa’s lips twitch in a semblance of a scowl.

“Yeah? How were they there?”

She stares at her feet, still swaying to and fro. Her silence weighs the air down around them — gravity seems like a much more formidable force than before. Kaito takes the opportunity to trace her with his eyes, constructing an indelible image to remember later tonight.

“I...I just — ” Her eyes widen as she desperately seeks purchase in the form of the right words. Her gaze flickers over to him. “Would you promise me, Momota-kun? That you won’t say anything about it?”

If it’s so serious, he can’t imagine why she’d be so ready to impart it on her third day of knowing someone. This is the kind of trust that would typically frustrate him and push him to the edge of lunacy. He tempers himself, maintaining what he hopes is a passive expression.

“It’s a promise.”

“I lied to you. My mom isn’t sick. I don’t have a dad. My mom moved here for her job.”

The words spill out of her mouth, as though she’s been waiting years to finally lend her voice to them.

“My classmates...my teachers...they knew that I never had a dad and they never let it go.”

Her lip quivers.

“To tell you the truth, I want to be friends with everyone. But when I open my mouth to speak, all I hear is what those kids used to say to me and I stop,” she confesses. Her knuckles go white around the chains.

“You don’t need to worry about that with me. I’m not that kinda guy,” he says. “I already know people are shitty. It’s not like you asked to be born that way. I didn’t ask to be born to my own fuckin’ parents. Like I can even call them that.”

This is a fucking nightmare. He hates this. He loathes every part of this. The way she peddles her faults as though they’re something to be pitied or praised. The way she wastes no time in unfolding herself, baring her secrets written in red ink across the page of her soul. No, she doesn’t need to worry about that with him. He isn’t that kinda guy. But if he was, she would succumb in an instant. She would suffocate on her own shortcomings while he watched, detached, a spectator.

Still, he bears it and listens to her. There’s no getting around this part. He listens and listens, biting his tongue until the moon shows its waning face at the apex of the mountains.

“We should get going,” she says. Helpful. “I had a really good time. Thank you, Momota-kun.”

“Listen, Harumaki — you mind if I call you that?”

She brings a hand to her chest, eyebrows shooting up in alarm, before leaning in close to him.

“No, not at all! No one’s ever given me a nickname,” she chirps. Her benign enthusiasm disgusts him on some unnameable level.

“We’re gonna hang out again soon, Harumaki,” he declares.

She nods, scarlet eyes twinkling with unfortunate innocence.

* * *

They spend time together nearly every day, only parting when the sun has descended behind the mountains. So timid, so timorous — Kaito is shocked when she readily makes an incision in her heart and allows her most intimate thoughts to bleed out in front of him. He vacillates between relishing in her trust and resenting her for it.

He learns a lot about her. He files some things away, forgets others. He’ll listen to her with rapt attention, sure, but he needs to prioritize.

By contrast, she hangs on to every word he says for dear life in a way that no one has quite done at any point in his own life. She laughs at his jokes, corroborates his frustrations with his life. She similarly laps up any question he asks her, any compliment paid.

This is fun. He’s having fun, he concedes as they sit under an oak tree in Komachi Park. When was the last time he felt like this? Going out with classmates is going through the motions for him — he feels nothing for it and never has, no matter how much they admire him. He wants to sweep a net across this feeling and funnel it into a jar where it can never decay or depart.

The sight of her face calms him. The time that flows naturally with her ameliorates him. He finds himself sleeping soundly for the first time in years.

* * *

“Where are you going?”

Harukawa stops in her tracks and turns around to face him.

She was about to waltz out the school gate as though he hadn’t been waiting for her the whole time.

“Taniguchi-kun asked me if I wanted to go to the pachinko parlor with some of the others,” she replies. She looks just as content at the prospect of spending time with them as she does when he’s with her.

A feeling, caustic and constricting, stirs beneath his sternum and locks his muscles up; it travels along his nerves and shrouds his mind.

“What, am I not fun enough?” he quips, scratching his neck casually.

Harukawa’s eyebrows furrow in confusion. That confusion promptly gives way to anxiety; she fidgets with her hair. She does this when she’s nervous, he’s noticed. She also has the tendency to shuffle her feet and stare at the ground. She does all these things more often than not. The image of her knees knocking together on that first day of class emerges in his mind’s eye.

“No, it’s not that. I just haven’t spent time with any of our other classmates since I moved here. A-And you didn’t say you wanted to hang out tonight.”

Is it panic that seizes his breath? Is it jealousy that brews in his blood? Those words have such negative connotations that he only passively accepts that they may label this sensation. He closes his eyes, regulates his breathing. He’ll forgive her for testing him like this, but he won’t acquiesce.

“So? If you didn’t wanna hang out, you should’ve told me and I would’ve just gone home.”

“Wait, why don’t we just go together?”

Crestfallen, he sighs.

“Those guys...I’ve hung out with them before and they’re pretty damn boring. It’s not like they’ve invited you out until now either, right?”

She tenses and worries her lip between her teeth. The sensuality of it taunts and teases him — he hates her for that. Will she really capitulate? For a single daunting moment, he doubts it.

“I...I guess I could just hang out with them a different time, right?” She gazes up at him for confirmation that she is, indeed, making the correct choice.

He exhales with relief.

“Yeah! They’ll always be there,” he affirms.

On some level, he knows it’s absurd. Even if she were to spend time with them, they would never have the access to her secrets that she has bestowed upon him. But he can’t take that risk, can’t risk the wholesale distribution of her attention, no matter how low the odds.

“I didn’t want to go, anyway,” he hears, her voice vague and muffled. He’s still agitated that this conversation needed to take place this early, but better now than later — the sound of her voice, even in the distance, gives him all the justification he needs.

* * *

They text deep into the night long after they part ways. She replies instantly, peppering her messages with kaomoji, sending him things like _good night, sleep well!_ Those never fail to make him laugh as he holds his phone above his chest on his futon.

He didn’t realize how desperately he needed this distraction until now. He can finally trust her — as much as he can trust anyone, anyway.

* * *

Kaito takes her to one of the fields away from the farm and away from his complex. He rotates points of origin frequently, if for no other reason than to entertain himself. It’s a good night — moisture saturates the air and there’s a decent amount of dry brush here.

He produces a grill lighter and a thermos from his bag and approaches the brush pile.

“M-Momota-kun,” she rasps, “what is this? What are we doing?”

“Come on, Harumaki. I bet you’ve never done anything outta line in your life. It’s time to live a little!”

He gestures for her to come closer to the heap of debris. There’s a brief moment where she stands in place, sculpturesque, considering the sight before her. Reluctantly, she takes a small step toward him, then another, until she’s by his side.

“You know how there’s jack shit to do around here, right? This is how you gotta get your kicks in the country,” he explains, flicking the switch on the grill lighter and examining the suspended flame. “Back in the day, they used to use cigarettes and a pack of matches, but shit. Can you imagine how much of a trail that’d leave behind? And a waste of perfectly good cigs, too.”

“I-Isn’t this...illegal?”

He shrugs. “I guess. Not like I’m going around lighting people on fire. You’d probably get in some shit if someone caught you, though. Hasn’t happened to me and I’ve been doing this for a while. Okay, stand back.”

She does so as he introduces the flame to a small opening in the brush. It takes, despite the humidity, and radiates outward, charring all that it touches. Kaito takes a few steps back as he unscrews the cap on the thermos.

“This is the _really_ satisfying part,” he informs her. She looks equal parts enthralled and fearful, just as she should.

He tosses the pungent contents onto the fledgling flame. The fire leaps up, affronted, before intensifying and spreading at a more urgent pace.

“Do we watch it like this?” she asks. Her chest rises and falls at irregular rates.

“Uh, no. Don’t just stand there unless you wanna be toast. The whole point is to let it burn from far away.”

He grabs her hand and they dart across the field and onto the cool asphalt of the road. They’re a good quarter of a mile from the point of origin now. The inferno has consumed the brush pile; the flames reach up into the sky, toward the stars, yearning for something they can never touch.

“Y’know, there’s just something about watchin’ it that really calms me down. Do you get what I mean?”

“I don’t know...this could really hurt people, couldn’t it?” she murmurs.

He hadn’t been anticipating dissent, and the wire between him and the full potential of his anger grows thinner. The tension in his jaw intensifies.

“I’ve gone through a lot of shit in my life. If this helps, I’m gonna do it. I haven’t hurt anybody. I’m gonna try to keep it that way.”

Intimidated, she shrinks back. Positively defenseless. He has no respect for that part of her, that weakness waiting to be capitalized on.

He continues.

“And what about you? You’re just gonna keep going through life pretending no one’s done shit to you? That you’re not pissed about it?”

“I am!” Harukawa protests. She balls her hands up into fists — her expression challenges him.

“You remember what I told you that day we first hung out? I’m gonna elaborate on that.”

He turns to her, narrowing his eyes, wanting the memory of his face and his words to brand itself on the walls of her mind.

“People are wastes of space. All of them,” he says lowly. The repressed rage returns and bubbles up in his chest. “Self-righteous pricks. I hate them all.”

Her lips part in ostensible shock.

“Except for you, obviously. We’re two of a kind,” he adds, placing a hand on her trembling shoulder.

She yields to his touch.

* * *

“It’s about time you try this for yourself, huh?”

“Can I?”

“I was pretty convinced you were gonna fuck up. I’m still not sure, but you’ve watched me enough.”

After an abnormally lengthy walk, they’re far away from the residential areas. He wasn’t about to risk an amateur messing everything up. The mountains tower over them, imposing and omnipresent.

A bush is the safest bet for a beginner. The air is still tonight, which makes their job much easier.

He proffers the lighter. “Here.”

Harukawa reaches out and takes it. She does not hesitate.

A roiling sense of pride, ashy and insidious, courses through him at the sight of her steady hand flicking the grill lighter switch. She moves closer to the bush and makes contact, backing away as the flame catches on.

They abscond from the scene until they’re a decent distance away. The fire rages on — smoke dances sensuously in the sky.

“Wow. I did that.”

“Feels pretty good, doesn’t it?”

“I didn’t think it would,” she concedes, “but it does.”

“Are you afraid?” he murmurs.

Harukawa’s hand, small and delicate, reaches out to him, a question in her fingertips.

“It’s scary, but I’m not afraid when you’re here.”

He takes it into his own and answers.

* * *

That answer was conditional, he soon realizes.

Kaito grants her slightly more autonomy; she starts bringing her own materials now. He sizes up their target as she takes something out of her bag.

His heart skips a solid beat when he sees that it’s a book of matches — and she’s about to strike one against the phosphorus. Panicked, he wraps his hand around her bony forearm and jerks her body toward him, sudden enough to startle her and close enough to get them out of her hands.

“Did I not fucking tell you that we don’t use matches?” he bellows, tearing them out of her grasp.

Taken aback, she clasps her hands at the level of her chest.

“I — I just forgot — ”

“‘Forgetting’ could’ve gotten us both into deep shit.”

Angry tears cling to her eyelashes. “I’m sorry. I’ll remember next time.”

“I hope so.”

He runs a hand through his hair. One, two, three. The incipient rage doesn’t simmer down.

“By the way, you need to fucking quit it with the ‘woe is me’ act every time someone says somethin’ you don’t like. Maybe if you listened, shit like this wouldn’t happen.”

Kaito shoves the matchbook in his pocket and turns on his heel. He can’t stomach that doe-eyed face right now, that wavering voice.

“Kaito? Where are you going?”

He can’t answer that. It’s bad enough that she hasn’t learned when to quit.

“Kaito...”

Maybe she never will.

* * *

He tosses and turns that night. The age of the building means that the fall chill sneaks through every crack and crevice in the infrastructure and the blankets he piles on are never enough. He should be waking up for school in just a few hours. Still, a pernicious paranoia racks him.

She should’ve known better, but there’s the gut-wrenching possibility that she’ll rebel. Offended, she’ll leave and refuse to speak to him, and then the control he’s managed to introduce into his life will disappear — it’ll completely disappear and he’ll be left no better off than he was before.

He gropes around for his phone.

_Harumaki? You awake_

_Listen I’m sorry for that shit I said. I was just kind of in a bad mood and I freaked out. I was just scared for both of us yknow? I’ll make it up to you_

If nothing else, it’s the truth. A reply comes almost instantly.

_It’s okay. I know I didn’t make it better...I’m sorry too._

The coil of concern loosens.

_Forgiven_

* * *

“They opened _Danganronpa_ applications today.”

After last time’s fiasco, they’re back on the swing set at Mukogaoka Park. Harukawa paled at the prospect of trying again, and he’s up for giving her a pass for tonight.

“Oh, that’s that reality show, right? I haven’t watched it much, but it’s interesting,” she says, cavalier.

“I’ve been watchin’ for years now. It’s gonna be my ticket to freedom from this hellhole. Shit, it’s gonna be my way out of all these goddamn rules I have to follow living here,” he opines. “Yeah, there are rules on the show, but not like in the rest of society. And once I win, I won’t have to worry about a damn thing.”

“I think you could do it.” She smiles, gripping the chains on either side of the swing.

“Why don’t you do it with me?”

She sighs and considers it.

“I don’t know. I don’t think I’d be any good at a game like that...I don’t think I’d survive.”

“Come on. Don’t be so pessimistic.”

“Do I look like the sort of person who’d be successful?” she deadpans.

He laughs despite himself. “Only one way to find out.”

“I guess it’d be fun...” She studies the star-studded sky above them.

He doesn’t wait for her. He _can’t_ wait for her. When he gets home, he slams the door shut and navigates the maze of his apartment to find a particular packet of papers. It somehow wedged its way between a pile of laundry — is it clean or dirty? he can’t recall — and a pile of dust-caked textbooks. He fills out the application in jagged hiragana, black ink smearing and bleeding through the paper.

* * *

“Are you doing anything after graduation?” she asks.

They stand against the wall of the abandoned barn. This September night is unusually balmy, warm enough to coax the cicadas into a song.

He can’t believe she’d ask him this question. If there’s anything she should’ve learned the past few months, it’s that he has no interest in college or weaving himself into the fabric of society at all for that matter.

“God, don’t even ask. I still can’t believe we’re graduating.”

“It’s been a few months, hasn’t it? It’s really flown by. It feels like you took me here for the first time yesterday,” she muses.

“Damn, you’re right. I kinda can’t remember what things were like before you showed up,” he lies.

“I’m happy,” she declares, wrapping her arms around her chest and hugging herself tightly. “I’m happy I met you, Kaito.”

A sudden desire, lascivious and irresistible, comes over him. He advances until his face is mere inches from hers.

“Harumaki,” he whispers, “you like me, don’t you?”

Her eyes shift, tracking his, searching for the meaning behind the question.

“Yeah. Of course I do!”

She looks up at him with unconditional trust, and now more than ever, he comprehends what he represents to her. The implied promises that he won’t stay beholden to. The sweeping desire to give herself to him until she has nothing left to give.

This is it — the last step to staking his claim entirely. The last step to ensuring he’ll never be alone.

He kisses her then, planting two hands on either side of her torso and pulling her toward him. She fails to respond at first; he persists, and she acquiesces, moving her lips reluctantly against his.

He sinks his teeth into her lip and grips her wrist, slowly guiding her hand downwards. Her hand feels frigid against the throbbing warmth of his skin. He relinquishes his hold on her lip and keeps her close, reveling in their proximity.

“Kai...Kai — ”

Harukawa’s breath is hot against his lips. Her body shakes violently against him before freezing entirely — not unlike a corpse in its sarcophagus. His fingertips stroke the curve of her neck, feeling for her pulse.

“I don’t know if I want this,” she says, voice cracking with indecision.

“Then I’ll decide for you.”

He withdraws a few inches, surveying her tousled hair, her emotive eyes that are traitor to her heart, the very eyes that drew him to her that fateful day they met.

Ecstasy, inebriating and insidious, flows through him.

Kaito places his hand on top of her head, ruffling her hair in a preliminary gesture of affection, before pushing down gently. She sinks to her knees as her legs fold.

The corners of her eyes water. Her lip trembles. She’s afraid. There’s not much he can do about that — fearing something so minor is inane, and she’ll need to learn that for herself. Surely, she realizes that this isn’t a sustainable way to live her life.

He sighs.

“You gotta learn sometime, Harumaki. It might as well be now.”

The night swallows up the sound of metal clashing against metal as he unbuckles his belt.

* * *

When Kaito saunters into his classroom the next day, she isn’t sitting in her seat. He swallows thickly and collapses into his chair, eyes fixated on where she should be.

He gives it a minute or five before furtively pulling his phone from his pocket and texting her.

_You okay?_

His stomach lurches.

_I’m sick._

That seems convenient. Very fucking convenient. He tempers his urge to seethe.

_You need anything?_

He isn’t sure what he wants the answer to be.

_No_

His relief resolves that ambiguity.

* * *

Harukawa actually does look sick — even moribund — when she returns to school the next day. The grey cast to her skin saps any semblance of vitality from the rest of her. Violet circles reminiscent of bruises cradle her eyes.

They don’t talk in class. He makes blithe conversation with their classmates during their lunch period and arms himself against her envious gaze in the periphery.

He waits for her after the last bell rings by the school entrance.

“I missed ya, Harumaki.” 

“I don’t want to do that again,” she mumbles, skipping the pretense of a greeting.

“That?” It takes a moment for his mind to make the connection. “Oh.”

He has no interest in making a scene here; for the moment, he begrudgingly defers.

“Okay. We don’t have to do it again. But we’re still hangin’ out, right?”

She nods silently. Her eyes, normally so expressive, are opaque and inscrutable.

* * *

The atmosphere between them has changed notably and not for the better. Kaito opted to bring her to his place tonight if only to assuage her anxieties. The fact that it’s getting colder outside doesn’t help.

She spends most of her time studying; he, watching TV. This awkward silence sits on top of him like an anvil, an uncomfortable weight that he can’t quite shake.

When the clock inches toward the nine o’clock mark, she finally speaks.

“I’m kind of tired. I’m probably going to go home soon,” she mutters.

Kaito sits up from lying on his side and looks at Harukawa. He looks at her and, for once, he truly sees her. The way her clavicles jut out beneath the collar of her shirt. The winding curves of her pale thighs. Her pale lips, chapped from constant biting.

He mollified her with promises to refrain from trying anything again. But how fair is that? How fair is it that he’s spent all this time with her, that she claims to like him, and she suddenly withholds?

He doesn’t believe it. He doesn’t believe that she doesn’t want it, and such a coquettish expression only serves as an invitation — one that he will gladly accept. He slides a hand up her shirt; his fingers ghost over the fabric of her bra. She freezes.

“You know, Harumaki, I want more than what you gave me, and you’d be lying if you said you didn’t want to give it to me. So I’m not really seein’ the problem with trying it again.”

She bats his hand away, features contorting in disgust.

“You said you liked me,” he accuses.

“I don’t like you when you do this,” she counters. She has put up her shields — her eyes dissect him with the precision of a coroner.

“What, this?” he taunts, wrapping an arm around her waist and pulling her toward him until they’re flush against one another.

That action flips a switch. Her pupils constrict — the image of an imminent implosion.

“ _No!_ ” she screams. She plants her hands on his chest and pushes him away; he nearly loses his bearings before steadying himself on his feet. Her chest rises and falls erratically as she gasps for air like a cornered animal. “Don’t _fucking_ touch me!”

“What the hell? Where is this coming from?” His hands shake, though he cannot identify the cause — he doesn’t know what he’s feeling.

“I didn’t want it! I don’t want any of it!”

“Harumaki...”

She buries her face in the palms of her hand, shoulders convulsing with raw emotion. “Why? Why me? What did I do to make you hate me so much?”

“Hate you? Have you lost your goddamn mind?” He takes a step toward her cowering form. “If I hated you, I would’ve told everyone in that fucking school what you told me that day. I would’ve told them that cute little Harukawa-chan’s dad hated her before she was even born and her mom was a slut who couldn’t keep ‘em closed. That’s what I would’ve done, but I didn’t!”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

The wire snaps.

“You fucking bitch,” he snarls. Her pigtails are in a woeful state of disarray — the edges of his vision turn hazy as he wraps his hand around the left tail and yanks, eliciting a dulcet cry of pain. “You were just using me, weren’t you?”

That’s exactly what she was doing, he thinks through the hailstorm of wrath howling in his head. Taking his companionship with no intentions of ever returning the favor in an appreciable way. Just another person who sought to sap him of what he had to give.

The years of desperation and disappointment, the eternity of distrust and disillusionment, ignite a column of fire within him that consumes him from head to toe. The girl lying before him epitomizes the betrayal that has assailed him at every turn. He would cry if he were capable of such a thing.

He grips her hair harder.

“You’ve got some fucking nerve, I’ll give you that. Because you know you’re gonna be alone after this, right?”

“I don’t care! I’ll stay alone. I’ll stay alone forever! At least I know how to _be_ alone!” she sobs. She splays her hands across the floor and stares daggers at him through her tears.

His fury morphs into pity. Pity that she’s been so conditioned to deny what she surely desires. He unclenches his hand, letting her hair fall through the spaces between his fingers like the silk of a spider’s web.

“Fine. That’s fine. No big deal to me. But,” he warns, squatting down so that he’s at eye level with her, “just remember that you chose this.”

* * *

He skips school to take the four hour trip to Tokyo after receiving a callback in the mail.

She fled his apartment last night with all the abandon of the last girl alive in a horror movie. It weighs heavy on his mind during the train ride, though he can make neither heads nor tails of how he feels about it. He bites his nail as the paranoia creeps back up on him — the prospect that this really might be the end chills him down to his marrow.

When he arrives at the studio, he’s all but forgotten about her. The thoughts and anticipation of what’s to come bury her to the depths of his mind. He takes a seat in the waiting room, folding his arms and tapping his foot restlessly.

He wants to wrangle time into accelerating. After an indeterminate amount of agonizing minutes goes by, he finally hears a door creaking.

A woman, plain and unremarkable, emerges. Her lapel pin displays her name in embossed text: _Tsumugi Shirogane, Creative Direction._

“Kaito Momota? You can come back with me.”

Entirely too enthusiastic, he leaps to his feet and follows her through the door and into a large studio with wooded floors and mirrored walls.

“Have a seat right there, please,” she says, gesturing to the chair in the center of the room. A camera is suspended above the desk across from the chair. He does as she says.

“All right. We’re going to start recording now. Tell us your name for the camera.”

“Name’s Kaito Momota from Nagano.”

“Got it. So...tell us why you’d like to participate in _Danganronpa_.”

His heart already begins to beat faster. He’s been waiting for this moment for years. There were obvious distractions obfuscating his exhilaration, but it all returns in a flash flood. A thin sheen of sweat coats his forehead.

“I hate rules and I hate the people who make them. Hell, I hate people, period. But you know what I hate the most? The people who just smile and think that this is how we’re supposed to live. They give up and accept the impossible. They just want everyone to get along.” He leans forward and regards Shirogane intently. “I don’t buy it. If I’m gonna be on this show, I’m gonna kill them first.”

“You seem very confident about that.”

“You have no idea,” he says shakily. “I’m not just gonna be in _Danganronpa_ , I’m gonna kill everybody and win! Once I’ve got fame and fortune, I don’t gotta worry about what’s impossible.”

His heart pounds, rising up into his throat. This passion, this truth — to unfetter it and allow it to emanate around him, to let it fill the room with thick and intoxicating tension, is a pleasure far more profound than any fire could hope to inspire.

This is freedom. This is the ambrosia he has relentlessly pursued with nothing to show for it up until now. This is who he unapologetically is.

“As for my talent? Dunno. But I want it to be somethin’ you can’t forget. Something that puts me above the rest.”

Every nerve in his body is singing with euphoria — he has no desire to collect himself. Shirogane hastily jots down notes. She continues to ask him questions, her expression ever impassive. After some time, she takes the remote sitting on the desk and clicks a button, presumably ceasing the recording.

“I think that’s enough for now. You have some excellent charisma, Momota-san.” Shirogane looks up at him, beaming, and adjusts her glasses. “I don’t want to get your hopes up just in case, but I’m thinking you’ll be hearing from us in a few weeks.”

The adrenaline continues to flow through his veins.

He’s about to get up to leave when Shirogane lifts a finger.

“Momota-san, would you happen to know someone named Maki Harukawa?”

The adrenaline comes to a halt.

He settles back down in his seat and folds his arms over his chest.

“Yeah...yeah, I do. She’s a classmate,” he replies, feeling uneasy.

Shirogane laughs. It isn’t a pleasant sound.

“She came and tried out just last week and I have her audition tape. She mentioned your name. I’m really not supposed to do this, but would you like to see it?” She tilts her head and tucks her hand under her chin in coy invitation. “Just to satisfy your curiosity?”

Does he want to see it? Does he want the rage to throttle him again? Hell, why not. He lives off the stuff.

“Sure. I wanna see what she said.”

Shirogane strides over to him while she swipes her fingers across a tablet. She hands it to him and hovers as he watches.

Harukawa sits in the very chair he’s sitting in at this moment. Dark bags underscore her eyes, contrasting with her otherwise pristine skin. It’s the face of someone who’s spent their entire life seeing ghosts.

_“My name is Maki Harukawa. I live in Komagane, Nagano Prefecture.”_

In retrospect, it seems so fucking stupid, so fucking asinine, to suggest that someone like her should even bother applying for _Danganronpa_. She’s easy prey, a complete waste of their time.

_“My friend and I are trying out together. Oh, his name? Am...am I allowed to say it? In that case, his name is Kaito Momota. We’re in the same class.”_

He inhales sharply and covers his mouth in contemplation.

_“I’m worthless. I was a problem my dad never wanted to solve. My mom is really sad because I exist. I’m invisible to my classmates...Ka-Kaito’s my only friend.”_

He can’t look away despite every molecule in his body screaming for him to do so.

_“But I’ve been thinking about it, and I think I want to be the kind of person who can bring everyone together on the show. If I survived, it’d be the kind of feel-good ending people love, but if I die, it’ll make everyone want to fight harder to escape.”_

His wrist twitches with the urge to pelt the tablet against the mirror.

_“My talent? I don’t know what that would be...I’m sorry. But I can tell you this. I would want to have a talent that makes people think, ‘Oh, we can depend on her! Harukawa-chan will take care of us!’ That sounds like the sort of person who would die first, doesn’t it? I wouldn’t mind that. But maybe — ”_

Shirogane closes the video player. “You get the gist of it, I’m sure.”

Kaito’s mouth has completely dried up. The heat from earlier has faded into a persistent chill.

“Has something happened? She made it seem like you two were awfully close. Was she lying?”

“Yes. I don’t know what the hell she was thinking,” he says. The steadiness of his voice surprises him.

Shirogane’s gaze grows distant, pensive.

“She was a lot more interesting than I expected just from looking at her.” She smiles opaquely; he’s confronted by his pale reflection in her glasses. “You’re both...fascinating. We’ll be in touch, Momota-san.”

He leaves the studio feeling something resembling motion sickness. The moxie and bravado of just a few hours ago has fizzled out, leaving only scorch marks in its path.

On the train ride home, he still isn’t sure if she was talking about just him.

* * *

Harukawa refuses to talk to him. If Kaito is being honest with himself, that fact shocks him.

He told himself that it was really to his benefit. She served to prove him right — other people are a fucking plague. Unequivocally, indisputably.

His principles defer to his ego nonetheless. He won’t go down without a fight.

He slides into the seat in front of her at the end of the school day.

“Talk to me, Harumaki.”

She blanches at the sight of him. All at once, her offense insults him and exalts him — frisson racks him at the thought of having such power over someone.

“I have nothing to say to you.”

He sighs and rubs his temples. “I really lost control. You didn’t deserve that. I’m — I’ll try to be better.”

And he believes in those words wholeheartedly — but if he’s going to try to be better, she needs to try too.

“I don’t believe you.”

The wire grows ever tauter, threatening to snap at any moment. He squares his jaw and scowls.

“Why not?”

“ _Just go away!_ ”

She slams her fists on her desk; her outburst casts an immediate spell of stunned silence over the classroom, himself included.

The weight of her betrayal hits him like a wrecking ball to the chest, and he’s suddenly catapulted to square one in his pathetic life.

The tip of her nose is red as tears cascade down her face.

(Even now, it’s endearing to him.)

He sinks his fingernails into the sides of his arms.

“If that’s what you really want, then fine. I’m fucking leaving. See?” he taunts beneath his breath, out of earshot from the others. He stands abruptly and slams the chair against the desk. She jumps in her seat.

She has made it abundantly clear that this is a clean break, irreparable and irrevocable.

And just as he told her, that’s fine.

* * *

“I was on my way home from hanging out with friends. I was just about to make it back to my apartment when I smelled smoke and saw something bright in the field by my complex.” He folds his hands and furrows his brow. “I heard someone running across the grass and I hid by a tree. That’s when I saw her — there was no mistaking it in the streetlight. I don’t think she saw me. I live a little out of the way by some open fields, so it doesn’t surprise me that she’d pick a location like that.”

The fluorescent lighting of the police station has induced a dull throb in his head. He’s already reaped his rewards; he wants nothing more than to drag his feet back to his fucking prison of an apartment for once.

“Thank you for your cooperation, Momota-san. We’ll look into this matter right away.” The investigator scowls as he jots notes down on his legal pad. “It’s a relief. We’ve been keeping on eye on these fires, but we haven’t been able to come up with any solid leads, and they’re so small that it’s difficult to collect evidence.”

“I was afraid to say anything, y’know? She’s so quiet at school, I almost didn’t believe what I saw. But she’s got real distinct eyes. I couldn’t just lie to myself. I don’t like the idea of her going around burning stuff around my place, too.”

The investigator nods, half-listening to his spiel as he fills out paperwork. After some time, he looks up at him from his desk.

“Can the prosecutor call on you as a witness if this goes to court?”

Now is not the time to smirk, but he staves one off anyway.

“You bet.”

* * *

Harukawa isn’t at school the next day. No one raises any questions.

When she isn’t at school the day after that, nor the day following, a susurrus of speculation sweeps across the classroom.

Remorse occasionally slithers up his back and whispers in his ear. He always has the presence of mind to refute it. She was always an equally culpable participant — she lit some of those fires with her own hands. She watched it all burn, no different than him.

His gaze gravitates toward the empty seat in the fifth row every time he enters the classroom. Old habits die hard, after all.

* * *

“Momota-kun! I finally found out what happened to Harukawa!”

A classmate hurries up to his desk in the minutes before class starts, chestnut hair sticking out in all different directions. He quirks a brow inquisitively.

His classmate’s voice drops to whisper as she leans in and tells him what she knows. He feigns shock.

“That’s...that’s crazy. But she was always kinda weird. I hung out with her for a little while ‘cause I felt bad for her. This sorta thing isn’t as surprising as it should be. Don’t you think?” he posits.

“You’re right. So quiet...and she never hung out with us no matter how much we asked.” His classmate’s eyes brighten. “You’re a really good judge of character, Momota-kun! Did you think something like this was gonna happen?”

He leans back in his chair and steeples his fingers in front of him. He gazes at the mountains in the distance.

“I hate to say it, but I did.”


End file.
